a setback for countering CCP repression and influence (a Feb 2025 news story which I missed)
… the court cautioning against the risk of inflaming “anti-China sentiment”… 
In Feb, a jury found Boston man Litang “Henry” Liang (梁利棠) not guilty of US charges that he acted as an unlawful agent of 
government by supplying officials with information about individuals, dissidents and groups in the local Chinese community.
Liang was acquitted in federal court of charges that he acted as an unregistered agent in a case brought in 2023 that US authorities had portrayed as part of their commitment to counter efforts by government to silence its critics abroad.
“The defense, framing the case as a test between constitutional rights and anti-China sentiment within the US government, successfully cast 65-year-old Liang as a victim of free speech suppression, handing an implicit victory to the CCP in its global campaign to chill dissent.”
“ … the case laid bare a legal and geopolitical dilemma now familiar to national security experts: authoritarian agents exploiting American civil liberties not to expand speech, but to suppress it on behalf of a foreign government. This tactic — cloaking repression in the language of rights enshrined by Canadian and American governments — represents a growing vulnerability in democratic legal systems ill-equipped to confront covert foreign influence operating under the cover of legal process, and enabled by lawyers and judges who appear willing to legitimize CCP talking points.”
report by 
thebureau.news/p/former-chine
news story reuters.com/legal/boston-m
Quote
Byron Wan
@Byron_Wan
From 2018 to 2022, US citizen Litang “Henry” Liang (梁利棠) communicated with officials in Consulate in New York and Ministry of Public Security thru WeChat to provide names and pics of various Chinese dissidents / activists and organizations.
bostonglobe.com/2023/05/09/met
officials in Consulate in New York and Ministry of Public Security thru WeChat to provide names and pics of various Chinese dissidents / activists and organizations.
bostonglobe.com/2023/05/09/met